In a typical seat belt apparatus attached to a seat of a vehicle, such as an automobile, a seat belt restrains an occupant in case of emergency, for example, when a large deceleration is caused by collision or the like. Thus, the occupant is prevented from being ejected from the seat and is protected.
On the other hand, a seat belt apparatus for a rear seat of a vehicle generally includes a buckle which is placed on a seat cushion when the seat belt apparatus is not used. Therefore, when an occupant gets into the vehicle and tries to sit on the rear seat, the occupant is obstructed by the buckle placed on the seat cushion and cannot smoothly sit on the rear seat. Similarly, when the occupant tries to get off the rear seat and out of the vehicle, the buckle clings to the occupant's body and the occupant cannot smoothly get off the seat and out of the vehicle. In addition, since the buckle is left on the seat cushion, the appearance of the vehicle is degraded when the buckle is not used.
Accordingly, a seat-belt-storing apparatus has been suggested in which a buckle is stored in a buckle-storing section provided in a seat cushion of a vehicle seat when the buckle is not used, and is taken out from the buckle-storing section by an occupant when the buckle is used. An example of such an apparatus is disclosed in Japanese Examined Utility Model Registration Application Publication No. 3-20216.
In the seat-belt-storing apparatus disclosed in Japanese Examined Utility Model Registration Application Publication No. 3-20216, the buckle is not placed on the seat cushion while the seat belt apparatus is not used. Therefore, the occupant can sit on or get off the seat without being obstructed by the buckle, and the appearance of the vehicle is improved.
However, in the seat-belt-storing apparatus disclosed in Japanese Examined Utility Model Registration Application Publication No. 3-20216, the occupant must take the buckle out of the buckle-storing section each time the occupant sits on the vehicle seat and fastens the seat belt. Thus, the occupant must perform a cumbersome task to fasten the seat belt. In addition, in order to ensure the seat function of the seat cushion, the size of the buckle-storing section is limited and remains very small. Therefore, it is difficult to take the buckle out of the small buckle-storing section, and this makes the task to fasten the seat belt more cumbersome.
In view of the above-described situation, an object of the present invention is to provide a buckle device which allows an occupant to smoothly sit on and get off a vehicle seat and with which a seat belt can be easily fastened, and to provide a seat belt apparatus using the buckle device.